SAN ANTONIO - A pricing agreement between the U.S. and Mexico may have averted an antidumping investigation and all-out trade war, but importers along the border said Monday the deal could mean significantly higher prices for Mexican tomatoes.

The draft agreement, announced late Saturday, raises the reference price for winter tomatoes to 31 cents per pound from the current 21.6 cents per pound.

That approximately 10 cent-per-pound increase will raise the wholesale price for a box of field-grown Mexican tomatoes by several dollars, said Lance Jungmeyer of the Nogales, Ariz.-based Fresh Produce Association of the Americas.

'Unacceptably high'

"It's very mixed news," Jungmeyer said. "This deal beats the alternative of having tariffs and being locked out of the market by an antidumping investigation. But the prices that they've come to are unacceptably high.

"For a U.S. company that's been an importer of Mexican tomatoes all along the Southwest border," he said, "they're all of a sudden at a very severe market disadvantage from their competitors in Florida, California, and Canada."

The association last month predicted a "tomato cliff" should the U.S. Department of Commerce, largely at the urging of Florida growers, follow through with plans to end minimum prices set in 1996 to resolve antidumping claims. That likely would have prompted a new antidumping investigation, and with it onerous tariffs that would have compelled Mexican growers to pull out of the U.S. market.

The United States currently imports about 3 billion pounds of tomatoes a year from Mexico, more than half the U.S. market's winter supply and nearly 43 percent of the summer supply.

The association's report, conducted by Arizona State University economists, concluded the absence of Mexican tomatoes - should Mexican growers be priced out of the U.S. market - could double consumer prices for popular varieties to $5 or more per pound.

Wide repercussions

Importers on the Texas border said the repercussions would be felt beyond the cash register, as Mexico retaliated by buying less American produce.

In 2012, more than 160,000 loads of Mexican produce crossed through Texas' land ports, he said, and Rio Grande Valley cities have seen heavy investment in anticipation of even more imports with the opening of a new highway through Mexico.